


come what may

by ivelostmyspectacles



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Apocalypse, Awkward Romance, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, M/M, Psychological Trauma, Reality Bending, Season/Series 05, Season/Series 05 Spoilers, it's the apocalypse boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:20:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23528284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivelostmyspectacles/pseuds/ivelostmyspectacles
Summary: Jon and Martin leave the cabin.Outside, it's just about what they expected.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 12
Kudos: 120





	come what may

Martin’s fingers linger against the makeshift belt held secure at the width of Jon’s thigh, half mindless of the motion until Jon clears his throat from above him. Martin swallows. Once, he might have blushed at the position, at the implication, but… well. A good mood is a long way off. He wishes he was doing anything than securing the holster at Jon’s thigh, but he isn’t. His hands are meticulous, careful, caressing the buckle he wordlessly tightens another notch. This isn’t… this isn’t pleasure. This isn’t even caretaking. This is… prevention. Preparation. He wishes he were holding Jon for a better reason, wishes he could pull him against his chest and fall into bed and sleep like that, sleep for eternity… but, no. He doesn’t want that. He wants to leave. He wants to fix things. They can’t hide out here forever.

He slips the dagger into the sheath, and accepts Jon’s hand to get back to his feet.

“I think it’s fine?” He doesn’t pretend he isn’t bullshitting his way through this, too. Who is he to DIY a leg and dagger holster? Sure, he’s watched enough survivalist YouTube videos to think he knows how to get by, but this isn’t the same. They leave here, and Jon’s said he doesn’t think they’re coming back. “It’s not too tight?”

“I think it’s supposed to be.” Jon looks down at the dagger, a trickle of the old familiarity of distaste creeping into his face. “I’m not even sure– I–I’m not, I’m not exactly a survivalist, Martin.”

That’s true. Martin’s eyes linger on the burn on Jon’s hand, on the worm scars, the way his bones stick out gaunt from his skin and the shadows under his eyes. Jon doesn’t know a thing about survival of the fittest, and he walks into danger willingly. That had terrified Martin, once. Now… The Beholding won’t let Jon get hurt, he thinks. And he isn’t sure if Jon can even _die_ by conventional means. But there’s a lot out there right now. And he knows all of it isn’t going to be friendly. None of it’s going to be friendly to him, especially.

“You’ve been doing fine,” he assures him, and grabs his backpack to shrug on. They can’t keep lingering. They can’t hide out here forever. “You’ve been doing _well,_ actually.”

“Training with a couple of wooden spoons isn’t the same as actual _knives–”_ Jon stops, and swallows. And then he shakes his head, scarred fingers creeping under the straps of his own pack. “Sorry. I’m… I’m just–”

“Scared,” Martin says softly. It hangs there for a moment, a beat. Another. Jon lets out a breath. So does Martin.

“Yeah,” Jon admits quietly. “I still don’t think we should leave–”

“We _have_ to, Jon.”

“We–”

“We do have to,” Martin interrupts. He doesn’t need the influence of higher powers to know what Jon’s thinking. They’ve had the same discussion. Jon doesn’t want to go because he’s scared. Martin isn’t sure he wants to, either. But he’s scared to stay here all the same, and… and Jon’s right. It’s a prison here. 

“… I know,” Jon acquiesces, same as any other time this conversation has come up in the past few days.

Martin had begun preparing, ah, _apocalypse survival kits_ those few days prior. Everything they had that they could take as a source of assistance. Torches, matches, knives. He doesn’t know what it’s going to be like out there. He’s going to be taking the axe that Jon had brought from his own place, before all of armageddon had started, and Jon’s got that dagger. For… for what it’s worth.

… Christ, he doesn’t want to go. But he stands by what he’s said: they can’t hide out forever. No matter what awaits them out there.

He shudders at the thought. Jon zeroes in on it, takes a step closer into Martin’s personal space and looks concerned. “Martin.”

“I’m fine.”

“Are you cold?”

“Er, no.” He tugs a little self-consciously at the beanie his hair’s still currently spilling out of. He needs a haircut. Jon needs a haircut. Those things seem so mundane, now, when silver streaks both of their hair because of stress (?), because of The Lonely, when there’s an _actual_ apocalypse happening outside. “Not really. This is just to, you know, keep the hair out of my face. And it might be cold. Out there.” He laughs, humorless. “It might be snowing, for all we know.”

“I don’t think it would matter.”

_We probably wouldn’t get cold, anyway._ Jon doesn’t have to say it, because Martin’s already figured. “It just feels better to go into it as prepared as possible,” he says, and Jon’s expression softens.

“Right,” he replies. He takes another step closer, and then looks uncertain, close enough to Martin to touch but looking lost for it. He’s not good at initiating physical contact, hasn’t been even after that first verbal ‘I love you.’ Even in the past few days… weeks… God, how long has it been since Jonah had ended the world? Jon’s not improved, even if it doesn’t seem to be for lack of want.

Fear again, Martin supposes, and he smiles sadly as he reaches out to clasp a hand at the back of his neck, lean his forehead against Jon’s. Always the fear.

Jon relaxes, thawing enough to turn his head and press his cheek to Martin’s instead. He breathes out, and Martin can feel the air on his neck. Scarf. Right, he needs a scarf. Do they have a scarf? He puts both arms around Jon– so easy, these days, he’s so delicate– and squeezes. He wants to linger. He doesn’t think they should dare. “We should go, Jon,” he says, and then presses a kiss at his ear before pulling away. “Ready as we’ll ever be, yeah?” He can’t let himself get distracted. He can’t.

“… yeah,” Jon agrees, and Martin leaves him to fret over the dagger strapped to his leg and the backpack and his own long strands of hair that keep escaping the bun Jon’s taken to wearing it back in. He finds a dusty, neglected scarf in Daisy’s old wardrobe and offers it to Jon first before wrapping around his own neck, and then… then it’s time.

“We won’t be able to come back,” Jon warns, again, for the hundredth time.

Martin nods. “I’ve got everything I need.” Well, almost. He stops next to the door, and holds out his hand to Jon. “You?”

He’s hesitating, also for the hundredth-thousandth-millionth time, Martin knows. But it’s different now; there’s nowhere to run. He knows it. Jon knows it. That’s why he’s standing in the middle of the floor, fidgeting with his hands, and the pack straps, and anything else he can touch. Eyes roaming the room, the doorway to the bedroom, the bathroom, the windows, the door. Like he’s trapped, like he’s planning his escape. And Martin hates that look on him, but… they are planning their escape.

He catches Jon’s gaze, and holds onto it, just to try and… assuage him here, the best he can. He isn’t sure he’s qualified to, but it must work: Jon smiles, just a little, and finally steps forward. “Yes,” he agrees, and takes Martin’s outstretched hand. “I’ve got everything I need.”

He doesn’t look back at the cabin once he opens the door. He’s gotten good at leaving things behind these past few months. And he’s reminded of that, very visibly, by the fog that spills over the threshold. It’s still cold, and damp, and immediately clings to his socks and jeans. He swears he can hear the boatswain’s call in the distance, and the lap of the waves on the shore. He almost takes a reflexive step back, and then steels himself. He breathes in once, and then twice, and squeezes Jon’s hand.

He takes a step outside, and the old fears wash over him.

He’s ten years old, and his weight is being fussed over at their family gathering. He hates it. The fussing. He doesn’t like being the center of attention. He doesn’t like his body, either. He wishes they’d all leave him be.

He’s twelve years old when his father tells him he’s a disappointment. Well, he overhears it, anyway, and it’s enough. He gets his hair cut to look like his father’s and doubles down on his schoolwork. Getting good marks helps. Staying out of sight helps, too.

He’s fourteen when his mother starts to fall ill. He’s fifteen when his father leaves. He barely makes it to sixteen before he leaves school. He’s not even seventeen when his mother starts looking at him like she hates him. He doesn’t know why, but he keeps to positivity, and blames the illness. He only cries when he’s alone.

He starts working at the Institute. He spends every day terrified they’ll catch his lies on his CV, but he needs the job. The Institute is quiet. He keeps his head down.

Jon starts working. Martin gets a crush, and then he gets a promotion. And then he gets a complex, and terrifies at the thought of screwing up in front of his boss who doesn’t even like him to begin with. He’s scared he’ll do something wrong. He’s scared that they’ll fire him. He’s scared that he’s inadequate. He’d learned to be scared of that a long time ago.

The worms come in waves. He feels miniscule compared to them. He will be the one squashed beneath them.

Jon goes off the deep end. He looks at Martin the same way that his mother does, anymore: like he doesn’t recognize him at all. 

He loses them both, soon thereafter. Jon to a coma and his mother to a better place. He hopes it’s to a better place. At least she doesn’t have to suffer his presence anymore and Jon, well…

Jon was never going to love him, anyway.

He didn’t deserve to be loved. Alone was better. The Lonely was better–

There’s pressure at his hand, and it grounds him. For a second longer, he drowns, and then he’s choking, and spluttering, and his eyes burn with tears. The world blurs, and then settles into blackness. He doesn’t see anything he recognizes, but there’s pressure at his hand– Jon’s hand– and Jon, gasping too at his side, and Martin fights against the fear. He pushes back. He grips Jon’s hand tighter.

“– Jon?” he whispers. It hurts. His lungs rise and fill with oxygen, and he breathes out shallowly.

“Arc–” Whatever Jon was about to say, he chokes off. Swallows the syllable, and manages to continue. “Y– Yes.”

He breathes in again. And out. He focuses, or tries to. He does not focus on solitude. He is not alone, not anymore. Jon’s here. Jon’s here. “You– you alright?”

“Y… es.”

“Jon.”

“Yes.”

Martin breathes out. The world resituates itself as much as it can. Jon’s there next to him, wide-eyed and breathing hard. His eyes are… faintly green, glowing in the dim. That’s probably not a good sign. But nothing ever is, and he’s seen more eyes than that before. It’s fine. It’s okay. They’re okay.

He thinks he smiles, if he remembers how to, now. But Jon smiles back, just as small, so it must work. “Well, nothing’s come hunting us yet,” he says, and Martin shudders, but agrees.

“Nothing we aren’t used to already.”

He wants to know what Jon’s seen, stepping outside into the apocalypse. The way The Lonely had come to him, Jon had been taken with visions of… what, exactly? The things Jon feared had already come to pass. _Could_ he fear, or had The Beholding taken it all away from him? No… no. Jon still felt guilt. Jon still felt fear. Jon felt it All.

Come to think of it, Martin doesn’t want to ask what Jon’s seen.

“Okay. So… where do we go?” He squints off into the distance, but it’s a lot of murky blackness and the fog still hangs heavy at the edges.

“I…” Jon pauses, and then scoffs. Martin can feel him trembling at his side. “… don’t know, Martin. _I_ don’t Know.”

… figures, that. Martin breathes in again, to steel himself, the smell of salt and blood on his tongue. He hears seagulls. He rubs his thumb along Jon’s hand. “That’s okay.” Up ahead, he thinks he can just make out the hazy lines of a path. The path, the one they’d walked countless times to and from the village. It’s not at all inviting as it had been, once, but he thinks it’s still there. “Let’s head towards the village,” he says, and gently pulls Jon forward a step.

“It’s not–”

_“I_ know, Jon,” he interrupts. _It’s not there. No one’s there. It’s nothing. There’s nothing._ But he doesn’t know where else to go. “It’s just a familiar place to start.” Even though it’s not, not anymore.

“Okay,” Jon says quietly.

They walk in silence, a familiar thing. But it’s not either. Martin hears the ocean, and numbers repeated over in his head, and the familiar whine-and-whir of tape recorders. He doesn’t look up. He knows what’s up there already.

He’d kind of forgotten all the things he’s scared of. He’d kind of forgotten he’s scared of a _lot._

He keeps walking.

They pass by… something different. It feels different in his mind. Jon is fidgeting at his side. He must feel it, too. “Is this…” Martin squints into the murky, shapeless mass. He thinks it’s shifting, ever so slightly. “Is this the pasture?”

He’d been walking past here when… when the world had ended. He’d felt the change coming, like a storm in the air, but he’d realized too late. He hadn’t _realized_ it was more until he had looked up and watched lightning illuminate an eye in the clouds, and then the clouds had begun to hang lower, reaching down to swipe him away. Martin had run, but not fast enough to stop Jonah before it was too late. 

Jon shifts from foot to foot, and cranes his neck to gaze back at the sky. “Martin…”

“I know it’s not actually the pasture,” he says quietly. “It just… it just means we’re on the right–”

“We should go,” Jon interrupts. There’s a different kind of anxiety in his voice, and his eyes are flighty, looking from the sky to the ground to indeterminate points Martin can’t make out. The nervous energy is strung tight. Martin takes a timid step back, and Jon moves with him, but– too late.

The pasture– what’s left of it– _is_ shifting. Nondescript but absolutely… moving. It’s slow, a barely-there movement he can hardly track with his eyes in this gloom. Lazy and slow– lethargic, like a yawn, his mind provides, and then something slams into him. Hard. He loses hold on Jon’s hand, and goes tumbling.

He seems to fall for a very long time, and the axe in hand goes… somewhere. When the heavy weight from a moment ago lands on his chest and he feels around for it to defend himself, it’s gone. Disappeared into the shadows. So he swats at the thing instead, grabbing ahold of it to throw it off, but it’s long and coarse and wriggly, and his hands land in something tangible and wet and warm and _sticky._ He shrieks, even though he knows giving into fear now is bad… deadly, even. Human instincts. He can’t help it.

He’s about to roll over and hopefully _squash_ the thing– whatever it is, was– when something in the air… crackles. _What now?_ he thinks, wild and terrified. But there’s a thousand eyes on the back of his neck and the all-seeing one in the sky, and Jon’s form looms in the glow cast by it. Eyes upon eyes on the back of his neck and blinking open in the sky, and Jon’s eyes radiating the same green glow, wide and pupil-less.

“Oh Christ,” he blurts, and then the weight of the _thing_ on his chest is torn away. It screeches, and writhes, and Martin doesn’t have time to even scramble away before it twists into something smaller, smaller, and vanishes into a cloud of smoke that stinks of burnt hair and decaying flesh. He nearly chokes on the smell, nearly vomits from it. But Jon sways over him, the glow in his eyes sparking and dying, and Martin springs up to stop him from falling instead. “Oh Jon.”

In the faint glow from the eyes still watching them, Martin sees blood on his own hands. He tries not to think about it, although he manages about as much as he manages to calm his heart right now. He wipes them on his coat and wraps both arms around Jon. “Jon. What did you do?”

Jon doesn’t answer. Martin keeps saying his name until he does. Eventually, he does.

“Jon.”

“… yes.”

Martin lets out a breath into Jon’s hair, fallen down around his shoulders in the tussle and whatever had ensued. “I’m sorry,” he mutters. “For all my preparation…”

Jon laughs, once, against his shoulder.

“Took me by surprise. Then I couldn’t figure out where the axe had gone, it’s so _dark–”_

“Oh.” Jon turns his head, and pulls back to look up at him. “It’s… is it dark?”

“It’s…” He can see Jon clearly. More clearly than he knows he should be able to. Every curve and every angle, every scar and every emotion. The background fades to uncertainty, but Jon is bright in front of him. “It… is. In general, yeah,” he clarifies. “But… apparently not for you.”

Jon shakes his head, slowly. “No… I can see. I can See… everything.”

Martin swallows. “Right then. Um. Cheers. But you should… you should probably just stick to the dagger next time?” he tries, eyes flicking down to Jon’s begrudging weapon of choice, still sheathed neatly where Martin had put it.

“Oh.” Jon’s mouth falls open in a tiny look of surprise, and then twists into a smile that looks like a grimace. “Instincts.”

“Right,” Martin agrees, because he thinks he knows the feeling. “But best not give The Beholding any more than it already has, yeah?”

Jon nods, and then goes to collect the axe Martin had dropped in the attack there, which proves he _can_ see in this… darkness. Like he’d said. Also probably not a good sign, but Martin’ll take it, just like he takes the axe back from Jon and swears to himself he won’t drop it again. He should have made a belt loop too, although… slightly more dangerous than having a dagger in a sheath…

“What was that, anyway?” he wonders out loud. He can still feel the blood (?) on his palms, no matter how many times he wipes them on his coat.

“Shadows of the The Hunt,” Jon says automatically. Martin looks at him sharply, and he backtracks, a bit. “I just, uh… I _think?_ The, um, animalistic… fear of… being prey…”

So it was the pasture for sure, then. Martin wishes he hadn’t asked. 

“Right,” he says thinly, and reaches to feel for Jon’s hand again.

“We should go,” Jon says, again, and Martin’s the anxious one this time when he agrees.

So they walk on. He doesn’t let go of Jon. He’s afraid of what The Beholding might do to him if he does. On a lesser scale, he’s afraid of what the things lurking in the shadows and fog might do if Jon lets go of _him._ He’s just… really afraid. And really determined.

They walk on.

Once upon a time, he would have filled the silence with inane chatter. But he doesn’t do that anymore. Besides, he and Jon don’t need words. He thinks they both thrive better on silence, anyway. It’s just more… comfortable.

Jon is the one who breaks it.

It’s a tiny noise, more a sigh than it is anything else, and if Martin wasn’t so fine-tuned and high-strung to everything Jon said, did, or _didn’t_ do, he wouldn’t have even noticed. But he notices. He turns to him, a side glance meant to be casual worry because if Jon notices him worrying, he will try to hide it even further. But he still mostly looks okay, and he doesn’t say anything else. Martin looks back ahead.

He doesn’t know where they are. It feels like they’ve been walking for hours. His hands still feel covered in blood. The hand that’s holding Jon’s is getting clammy. He doesn’t let go.

Jon reacts again, soon. It isn’t a noise so much as it is a wince, a grimace of pain, but that’s enough. It’s enough.

“Jon?”

“Nothing.”

He wrinkles his nose. That response was too fast.

“I mean…” Jon realizes it, too. “It’s… a lot,” he admits.

Martin squeezes his hand. He hates hearing him sound like that. “What?” He can feel him trembling again. He isn’t sure he ever stopped, to be honest.

“It was… we’re almost to the town.”

He startles at that, because it feels like they’ve been walking a lot longer and a lot further than where the town should have been. Used to be. And he hasn’t noticed anything, hasn’t _felt_ anything, not like the pasture. He’s surprised, but he’s also sure the worst is yet to come and if they have to wander the nothingness forever, he doesn’t want to be attacked or weirded out every ten minutes.

“How can you–”

Jon laughs, once, strangled. A stupid question.

“Sorry.”

“Their fear, Martin. I still feel it all. They’re gone and… it all remains.”

He hates hearing him sound like that, too. Martin swallows, and pulls him along. The eyes in the darkness and sky haven’t stopped watching them. “Come on, Jon,” he urges, and Jon murmurs an agreement under his breath.

But his breathing does change. Martin hears it, the way it deviates from silent to sharp in a twisted familiar sense of panic. But it isn’t quite that. It isn’t quite that. It gets shorter, and quicker, and each breath comes more agonized the further they walk like it’s physically hurting Jon. It probably is.

Martin tries to soothe him, but not much is helping now. The trembling has gone to full body shaking and Martin wants to grab him and take him somewhere, anywhere, for just a moment, but there’s nowhere to go and nowhere to hide. The Beholding saw all. “Jon?”

Jon collapses to his knees, and Martin goes with him, still terrified to let go of his hand.

_“Jon.”_

“There’s– there’s so _much,_ Martin,” Jon whispers. His teeth rattle, and there’s tears building on his lashes. Martin’s chest constricts until it feels like he can’t breathe, either. “Their _fear–_ they were… they were so _s–scared–”_

“I know.” Jon can probably feel his fear, the touch of The Lonely and all of the other silly, less invasive ones. But that doesn’t bother Martin. Not right now. “I know, Jon. It’s not your fault.” He doesn’t think he’ll believe him, but he’s been saying it, anyway.

“Of… everything. Of… of the dark. And poverty. And losing the ones they love. Death… destruction…” He’s rattling on.

“Jon.”

“And spiders. Of course spiders, so many fears of bugs and… The Crawling Rot.” The glow is back, in his eyes, brighter than stepping outside, brighter than protecting Martin. There’s outlines, on his face and arms and skin. Martin sees them glowing beneath the layers of clothes. It isn’t the first time. They burn brighter the more Jon speaks. “Heights, and suffocation, public speaking, and… cities, Martin. So many people, here, afraid of the big cities…”

“Jon.”

“The wide open spaces didn’t scare anyone here; they were all so _afraid_ of being _trapped–”_

“Jon,” Martin repeats urgently, and squeezes his shoulders. “Jon, don’t listen to it. Stop feeling for it.”

“It’s just _there,_ Martin, all around–” He lets out a sob.

It propels Martin forward, wrapping Jon in his arms again like before. This time, to shield him, try and protect him from the eyes all around him. It’s difficult to do, when Jon’s made of eyes in times like these. But Martin still wants to wrap himself around him and block it all out, smothering the rest of the chatter with whatever is left of The Lonely inside him.

And it works, because he is still scared of being alone. Or maybe he’s just given into the promise of it. He had, before. With Peter. But he isn’t sure it matters anymore. He just knows he holds a power to break Jon free when The Eye gets its claws in him and won’t let go. And the only power he’d ever learned was harnessing The Lonely. He uses it to his advantage, and brackets Jon with his body, burying his face in his hair.

And it works. Slowly, bit by bit; it helps Jon stops breathing quite so hard. It helps him stop muttering all the old townsfolk’s terrors under his breath. It helps to get the eyes to recede. Eventually, it lets Jon sag against him, wrung out and exhausted.

Martin lessens his hold, just a little. “Jon?”

“… thank you, Martin…”

He hums, noncommental. Strokes his fingers through his hair and tries to wipe away a few of his tears. “Should we go back?”

“… there’s nowhere to go back to,” Jon murmurs, and yeah, Martin had basically guessed that but they need to not… stay _here,_ not where active civilization had been days, weeks, god, he doesn’t know how long it’s been, prior. Jon will drown beneath it if they stay. The Eye doesn’t want to hurt him, but The Eye will see all regardless. And so will Jon.

“We should go _on,_ then,” Martin says, squeezing Jon’s arm. They can go on until they’re out of the memory of this city, and then they can make camp. Whatever that will be. “Just for a little while longer. And then we can rest. Okay, Jon?”

“Mhmm…”

“Can you walk?”

“With… with some help.”

“I’ve got you,” Martin promises, and he does.

He half drags Jon out of this ghost town. He doesn’t pick him up and carry him for the sake of his pride, though. Too many things being taken away from him without his choosing. Martin lets him walk on his own two feet, careful and unsteady, until he feels the rest of the tension leave Jon’s body, and he knows that they’re far enough away that it won’t hurt Jon immediately any longer. So they pick a spot– any spot, it’s all the same, here– to settle down, and Martin pulls out his water bottle. He isn’t thirsty, but he takes a drink. Then he offers it to Jon, who takes it without a word. He’s probably not thirsty, either.

They forgo two sleeping bags for one; it’s a tight fit, but that’s okay. Jon had practically been glued to him since they’d settled down, anyway, silent and lethargic. Martin was privately glad he had experience pitching a tent on his own– a two person one, weight split amongst them, yes, Martin had brought it from home, _just in case,_ because who didn’t camp out at world’s end– because Jon had stared on blankly, and only smiled a little when Martin said “home sweet home” and gestured him inside. Even now, he’s still quiet, curled up against his chest, eyes closed. But he only has the two, and they’re not glowing. So there’s that.

“Did you fall asleep?” He whispers, just in case.

Jon’s lips curl. “I told you I can’t sleep, Martin.”

Right. He hasn’t forgotten. “Can’t, or don’t?”

Jon hesitates, and then seems to shrug. “I’m not sure.”

“Are you tired?”

“That’s not exactly it.”

Now Martin hesitates before the next question. “Hungry?”

Jon breathes out shakily, and wedges himself in closer to Martin’s body. “It’s not exactly that, either.”

“Okay.” He strokes his hand along Jon’s spine, and tries to settle. He doesn’t think there are any definitive answers, these days. _Define ‘these days’,_ says Jon’s voice in his mind, and he snorts softly in derisive humor.

Jon smiles. “Something funny?”

“No. Nothing.” He doesn’t want to dwell. He focuses on something else, something normal instead. “Just thinking I wish we had some marshmallows and chocolate.”

“Hm?”

“Waffle biscuits, too. Or chocolate chip cookies.”

“Martin.”

“You’ve never had a s’mores?”

“I don’t… ah.” Jon blinks his eyes open, recognition falling into them as he takes the knowledge from him. “No. I haven’t. It’s… American?”

“Yeah. You make them over a campfire, you know? Like, when you properly camp, not, like, end of the world camp.”

Jon chuckles, low and soft. He closes his eyes again. “You don’t need to eat.”

“I know.” He scoffs, even though he can’t get used to the idea. He knows it’s true. He can’t remember the last time he’d felt _hungry._ “But there’s a difference between a _need_ and a _want,_ Jon.” 

“Mhmm.”

He might not need to eat or sleep, but he still finds it in himself to roll his eyes. Fond amusement. Jon’s just… well, he’s still Jon. Some things haven’t changed, and Martin has never been more glad.

He ducks his head to press a kiss to the top of Jon’s head, and then is surprised when Jon shifts up to kiss him on the lips instead.

It isn’t their first kiss, not by any means, and he prays to… something… that it isn’t their last. But it’s startling enough in its presence, and the fact that Jon’s initiated it rather than a simple peck on the cheek or forehead. But Martin isn’t complaining; he kisses him back softly, and carefully, and slips his hands into Jon’s hair again because he can’t resist holding him like this. Mouth soft, fingers gentle. He kisses him, slow and uninterrupted, and he’s still the first one to pull back.

“What was that, then?” He can’t help teasing. Just a little. He tucks a piece of hair behind Jon’s ear and beams at him. A small speck of normalcy.

“Necessity,” Jon says, and curls up comfortably again, a tiny smile on his face.

“Didn’t you _just_ lecture me on needs and wants?”

“I wanted to,” Jon says, and it’s almost stubborn in an old familiar way that makes Martin laugh, properly. “Ergo, it was necessary.”

“Needs _and_ wants,” Martin repeats, still laughing, and gathers him tight against his chest again. “Both at once.”

“Yes. Whatever you say.”

Martin hides his smile against his hair again, and resumes stroking up his spine. “Try to sleep, Jon.”

“Whatever you say,” Jon repeats fondly.

Just for that moment, Jon in his arms… if it has to be the end of the world, he’s still glad he’s here with him. That won’t change… come what may.

… come what may, he thinks, and closes his eyes as well.

**Author's Note:**

> I meant to just write a tiny lil thing to get me back into writing mag with s5 and now look at this. can you believe this. _can you believe_


End file.
